E: Easy Crab Salad

Thank you (as always) for the very sweet comments on my baby shower pictures!! Like I said, the shower was just perfect and I am so thankful for my wonderful family & friends.

After a busy weekend, this week has been full of easy meals. One of my most favorite meals I had this week was an easy crab salad. I originally saw the idea for this salad in a magazine, but I accidentally threw out the magazine & recipe, so I improvised.

Easy Crab Salad (makes 2 large salads)

Ingredients:

• 6 oz crab meat, canned/cooked
• 1/2 can black beans, drained & rinsed
• 2/3 cups frozen corn, defrosted
• 6 cups of bagged spinach or spinach mix
• ~1 serving tortilla chips, crushed
• Dressing: 2 parts lime juice, 1 part olive oil, sprinkle of chili powder (adjust quantities based on how much dressing you want)

Directions:

Split spinach between two plates. In a large bowl, mix together remaining ingredients, including dressing. Top spinach with remaining ingredients. Serve up!!

 

 

This was a great salad! In fact, I had a repeat the next night ;).

Josh isn’t a fan of cold crab, so I made him up crab nachos. I used similar ingredients (minus the spinach plus lots of cheese):

  

What is your favorite easy salad? Weekend plans?? We are taking this weekend to get lots of things done around the house and to RELAX a little bit. I can’t wait! Josh and I are trying a new restaurant out tonight.

Pregnancy VLOG to come on Sunday. I will be answering one reader question and will be talking about the gestational diabetes test I had to take this week.  As a side note, I felt adventurous yesterday and put together the Pack n’ Play (thanks again Mandi :)) for the first time. It took me thirty minutes…but I have a feeling I’ll be able to get that thing apart and together in 10 minutes flat once I get used to it. Frank was very interested in what this new, crazy device was for:

 

 

E: Baby Shower

My baby shower was this past Saturday and it was absolutely perfect! My Mom, Mandi, Josh’s Mom & Sister put together everything. The shower was held at my most favorite spot, Charleston’s Cafe. My Mom & I:

Some of the ladies at the shower:

Josh’s Sister & Mom:

Me (in my Momma to Be Sash) & My friend Kelley:

Me & Ms. Mandi:

 

The tables were set up with pretty flowers, balloons and cute favors:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There was onesie decorating:

And fabulous food. Tina’s tarts:

Beverages:

    

And all the guests were able to order whatever they wanted from the menu. I stuck with a parfait ;):

And of course gifts! Cute outfits:

My friend Kelley got us the baby bjorn carrier (aka- the Carlos, if you’ve seen The Hangover). She even got us the aviators and baby aviators/hat to go with- HILARIOUS!

Baby cooking supplies (thanks Amelia!!)

And all the gadgets and goodies:

I cannot believe all of the gifts we got! We got all the big stuff (stroller, carrier, pack n play (thanks Mandi :)), bouncer, running stroller (cannot wait to use this!)) and tons of clothes, diapers, bibs, towels, etc! It was a perfect shower :) Thank you to everyone who put it together and all those who came!!

How is your week going so far? Mine has been great! Teaching, working, catching up on sleep and looking forward to the upcoming weekend :)

E: Vegetarian Crock Pot Baked Beans & Easter

   How was your weekend? Ours was really nice. Yesterday, we celebrated Easter at our house with a feast! My Mom, Aunt & I each prepared a few dishes for the occasion. I made pulled pork:

Vegetarian crock pot baked beans (recipe below):

  Desserts (sunflower butter cookies, chocolate chip brownies & tarts):

These AMAZING tarts were made by Tina and were leftover from my shower. They were a huge hit again on Easter. Thank you so much Tina!!

My Aunt brought a massive platter of shrimp:

My Mom made a warm chicken salad (I must get this recipe):

My Mom’s strawberry spinach salad:

Amazing fruit (my Aunt also knows I’m a fruit addict ;)):

And My Mom’s sweet potato fries:

My Aunt also brought coleslaw that I didn’t get a picture of. There were TONS of leftovers, but it was all so good!! I am a huge fan of pot luck meals. I’m just not a fancy, sit down dinner kind of girl (95% of the time). What about you?

Vegetarian Crock Pot Baked Beans

Ingredients:

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 2 gloves garlic, chopped
• 2 cans great northern or other white bean (DO NOT drain)
• 1/2 can black beans, drained
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 cup crushed tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon ground mustard
• 1/4 teaspoon ground red peppers
• 1 cup corn

Directions:

Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add onions and garlic and cook until onions are just starting to turn translucent.

Transfer onions/garlic into a crock pot and add all remaining ingredients except corn. Mix well. Cook on low for 4 hours. In the last half hour of cooking, add in corn.

Printable Recipe

E: Coleman Public House & Pregnancy Update VLOG- Week 26

This weekend has been so much fun…but it has been NUTS! We celebrated my Niece’s birthday Friday night, had my baby shower on Saturday (which was so fabulous and I will share a recap & pictures later this week), went to dinner with Josh’s family Saturday night & are having Easter at our house today! PHEW! So, here are a few pictures from our Saturday night dinner at Coleman Public House and my pregnancy update VLOG.

This was our first time to the restaurant, but we had heard good things from friends about their burgers & flatbreads. Josh & I:

We started with a few appetizers including the calamari (which I passed on, but it came with fried jalapenos, which the group loved) and the rosemary infused popcorn (which I hoarded at my end of the table):

Josh’s Mom, Sister & her boyfriend went with burgers and turkey burgers and said they were very tasty. Josh & his Dad both got flatbreads. Josh got the carnivore and loved it:

I got the Southwester salad. The chicken on top was chopped up super tiny! The avocado was amazing and the Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette was fantastic!

 

Overall, a great spot!

 

Pregnancy Update:  26 weeks

And a short VLOG! Sorry about the lightening/camera angle! I was in a hurry to finish a few things up before the shower ;). Let me know if you have any pregnancy related questions!!

 

Do you celebrate Easter? If so, what are you doing or what did you do to celebrate? Were you in charge of any dishes? I hope to be back with a recap of our meal tomorrow!!

E: Light Turkey, Asparagus & Squash Casserole

Happy Friday!! Any big plans? Like I mentioned before, we have lots of family & friends in town. Saturday is my baby shower (I can’t wait!!) and Sunday we’re doing Easter at our house. Should be a lot of fun.

Thank you all for you asparagus and squash recommendations from my last post. Some future meals I will be making include:

• Spring risotto (as suggested by Natalie)
• Vegetable lasagna (as suggested by Kelly)
• Grilled veggie wrap (as suggested by Lindsay)

Salah and Laura Allen both suggested a bake of sorts….so I went with it and created my own dish!

Light Turkey, Asparagus & Squash Casserole

Serves 2

Note: next time, I would make this with a little marinara mixed in vs. the 1/2 tablespoon olive oil. I think that would be fantastic!

Ingredients:

• 3 medium squash, sliced (1/4-1/2” thick)
• Bundle of asparagus (~18 stalks, chopped into bite sized pieces)
• 1 tablespoon olive oil (divided, 1/2, 1/2)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons Mrs. Dash Garlic & Herb seasoning (or similar seasoning, divided, 1, 1/2)

• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder (divided 1/4, 1/4)
• 2 tablespoons parmesan cheese
• 1/4 lb ground turkey
• 1 tablespoon bread crumbs
• Cooking Spray

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Add 1/2 tablespoon olive oil to skillet over medium high heat. Add turkey, 1/2 teaspoon Mrs. Dash, and 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder. Break apart turkey and cook through.

In a large bowl, mix together squash, asparagus, 1/2 tablespoon olive oil, remaining quantities of Mrs. Dash and garlic powder, turkey & parmesan cheese.

 

Spray casserole dish or dishes with non stick spray. Pour in mixture and top with bread crumbs.

I used these fun souped up bowls from Rachael Ray that my MIL got for me!

Bake, covered, for 30 minutes.

 

  

I ate mine as is with a fruit salad on the side. I tossed Josh’s on top of brown rice for bulk.

Printable Recipe

And a BIGGGGG thank you to Maria and Josh for the adorable outfit they sent for little Itzy :).  SO cute :)

 

Enjoy your weekend :)

M: Just Like Mama Used to Make

The other day I filled my house with food smells that reminded me of the days where my little brother and I would build forts in the living room with chairs and blankets. It reminded me of mud pies in the backyard and Nintendo games (the good ones…Mario Kart, Super Mario, pretty much just Mario games LOL). I was definitely in a happy place.

My mom is an amazing cook (and baker for that matter), but my favorite meals she made were the simple, southern, down home “suppers”. One of those meals always consisted of some type of meatloaf (beef or turkey), squash casserole, greens, and some sort of bread.

Because I’m lazy (and only cooking for two as opposed to her cooking for 6) I just went with the turkey meatloaf and squash casserole, but still, I think I would’ve made my Mama proud =)

The turkey meatloaf recipe can be found here. The squash casserole recipe? INCREDIBLY simple. I mean, pretty much any casserole can be made wonderful by adding sour cream and cream of chicken soup. I’m fairly certain it must be a southern thing. Anyway, my Mom’s squash casserole has no cheese like most recipes I’ve seen. But it is amazing, the creamy squash mixture paired with the crunchy topping is perfect to me! She knows she must make this every time I come home to visit.

So, here is my Mama’s super simple squash casserole recipe =)

Squash Casserole

6 cups sliced yellow squash

1 large onion, coarsely chopped

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 cup light sour cream

1/2 cup butter, melted

1 (8 oz.) package herb stuffing

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cook squash and onion in salted water until onions are translucent and squash is tender.

Combine soup and sour cream in a large bowl. Add cooked squash and onion mixture and stir well.

Combine butter and stuffing in a medium bowl and stir so that stuffing gets moist. Spread half of stuffing in bottom of a casserole dish. Spoon vegetable mixture on top. Sprinkle remaining stuffing on top of veggies.

Bake for 25-30 minutes or until hot and bubbly.

Enjoy!